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fleetwide video + action »

Who: a newly canon-updated peggy carter and YOU.
Broadcast: fleetwide video
Action: ss starstruck for crewmate and any visitors.
When: beginning today, but feel free to forward date something if you like.
VIDEO (FLEETWIDE)

[ stern-faced, peggy appears upon the network. ] Does 'zero matter' mean anything to anyone? Pointed, I know, and a bit a long shot...but -- if there's anywhere I might find some resource or knowledge about such matters, then the fleet is my best hope. Otherworldly mysteries are not well within my wheelhouse.

[ there are other questions she could ask -- but no, zero matter might be the safest inquiry out of a great many others. and even then, it's barely safe at all. but it must be asked, for now she feels most preoccupied with the work conducted back home. the fleet is almost a secondary thought -- a distant, archaic priority. ]

Alternatively -- [ she sighs. until now, she hasn't been agent cater within the fleet, much preferring to be the more social and civilian version of herself. ] -- I wouldn't mind hearing a bit more about worlds. Different worlds, universes, what have you. I know none have been successful in creating a rift between this place and any other but -- surely, such rifts must exist elsewhere.

ACTION (STARSTRUCK)

[ long story short: peggy carter took a nasty spill inside one of the sr shuttles, and is now back on her feet after being out cold for nearly a day. on the surface, it seems like nothing's the matter. not seriously so, at least. but as she goes about her ship duties, there's a glassy-eyed quality to her gaze. it takes her a little too long to remember someone's name -- as though she's reaching back by weeks or maybe months to recall details she'd been living every day.

find her in the kitchen, where she's preparing one of her two or three or sometimes four daily cups of tea. or find her in the cargo bay where she's trying to use the recreational equipment. she quickly gives up on the punching bag because although she no longer has stitches holding her guts together, there persists a tight ache in the flesh. she settles for the treadmill.

wherever else she might be encountered, her crankiness is persistent. ordinarily patient with her crew, peggy's kindness has been thinning out all week. she appears tightly wound and disengaged. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Wanda nods her head, she had noticed. She almost apologizes again, but decides not to. Not that she doesn't feel sympathy for her friend, but more so because this conversation would like soon devolve into Wanda apologizing for things that weren't exactly her fault. Instead, she reaches over to give her friend's hand a gentle squeeze.]

A lot of people have gone recently. For what is worth, I am happy to still have you here. Though, I know that must feel like bitter sweet comfort.

And I you, Wanda. [ they may never have known each other in their respective timelines, but there's something...sweet about finding friendship where one doesn't expect it all. ] No matter. I understood I had him on borrowed time. And people like you -- from the future -- have assured me that he goes on to live up to his potential.

[ she'd thought him dead, once. now she knows he's only lost. ]

[Wanda grins fondly at that.]

And then some.

[Her expression becomes more sober as a thought occurs to her, and she hesitantly asks her next question.]

When you went back home, you forgot again that he was... alive... didn't you?

I did, yes.

[ -- and does that twist in her gut? a little. especially in the wake of certain kisses and other outings. can she be blamed for a betrayal she never knew she was making? but then, she has to ask herself, is it worth putting her whole social life on stand-by because (one day) he might be found? ]

Barnes, as well. I forgot all about SHIELD, too. But thinking back on it now I can see the rough draft beginning to take shape.

[Wanda shakes her head. That inconsistency in one's memory cannot be easy to reconcile.]

How can this place do that? Affect our memory in such a selective way?

Hypnosis? [ her shrug isn't quite so nonchalant as she wishes it would be. ] Back home, there are some who have already achieved a great deal with muddling memory and molding the mind.

[As Peggy speaks, Wanda feels a slight chill. Messing with people's minds... there was a certain irony in her fearing that concept. While she has since promised herself to keep that part of her powers in check, there is still, naturally, some guilt to be felt there.]

These people back home... who are they?

A group calling itself Leviathan. [ ... ] But I've since been informed that HYDRA rears one of its ugly heads again, in time, and does much the same.

[At first, Wanda looks contemplative. "Leviathan," it was not a name Wanda was readily familiar with; however, it did sound similar to- And as Peggy says the very name she was thinking, Wanda visibly stiffens slightly. A more mix of emotions subtly play out on her face: anger, regret, a bit of fear.]

This "Leviathan" I do not know. But Hydra... I am familiar with them.

I'm -- I'm very sorry for that, Wanda. [ her apology is personal. indeed, she almost seems to take the responsibility onto her own shoulders. ] I'd hoped they were...eradicated, back at the tail-end of the war. And I was disheartened to learn otherwise.

[Wanda shakes her head.]

It is not something you should feel the need to apologize for. Hydra... is like a cockroach. They never seem to truly die.

[Internally, it does feel odd to refer to an organization that she more or less belonged to for a little while in such a way. However, she never did really consider them anything more than a means to an end. And they did have their own part to play in what happened to Sokovia.]

And I was one of the agents assigned to squashing that cockroach in its last few bastions in Europe once the war had started its ending. [ a thin grimace. ] Since coming here, I've learned that simply wasn't good enough.

[Wanda had learned as much from her time in Peggy's calibration room; however, to hear her talk about it like this openly with her was certainly more refreshing and engaging.]

As I understand it, they formed around one leader, did they not? But... he died, didn't he? Steve- Captain Rogers saw to that. Yet, they continued even after he was gone. You could not have predicted that they would thrive in his absence.

I suppose I couldn't, no. [ what she doesn't say -- what she harbours, darkly -- is that jim barnes explained to her how in later years someone manages to bend her ear or blind her eye. and zola is released. zola, who twists barnes into whatever winter's become.

back then, she'd never have thought to put the man to death. but it's what's been asked of her now. kill zola. no matter how hydra gets its fangs into shield, the rat (and the organization's other prisons) are like a shopping catalogue of hydra's worst hits. and peggy's the one who put them away. ]

But I know, now.

We always know better only after something has gone wrong.

[Wanda says it softly, even sounding a bit like she's talking to herself. She gives a small, gentle grin at the end. Letting Peggy know she can fully empathize with how she's feeling.]

To think they were lurking inside the SSR the entire time. [ she exhales -- feels her thoughts hitch upon reality, and tries again: ] Sorry. Sometimes I forget it's gone obsolete by your year. I meant to say SHIELD.

[Wanda smiles softly, grateful for the extra bit of context.]

Yes, I have only ever known them as SHIELD. Even then, it was only after New York that they and the Avengers became known world wide. Though, some of them have big enough personalities to have been known even before that.

[That was definitely a dig at a certainly iron-suited someone.]

Jim let slip that -- well, apparently I'm rather intended to have some hand in its creation. [ she fidgets. uncomfortable, perhaps, with that truth. ]

[Wanda smiles at that. To her, Peggy has no reason to be embarrassed. After Wanda saw what SHIELD was truly meant to be, from their efforts to help save Sokovian civilians, it seemed to her that Peggy had reason enough to be proud.]

That in no way binds you to being responsible for every wrong that may have happened under SHIELD's name. Whatever SHIELD became, I am sure it was founded with the best intentions.

A great many terrible things begin with good intentions. [ -- though, she is heartened by wanda's support. objectively, she understands how true those words could be. but peggy can't help but feel as though this place has offered her a second opportunity to steer everything onto the best path. now, if only she could remember... ]

But I digress. You had run-ins with HYDRA?

[Wanda visibly stiffens at the question, and her expression becoming notably more somber. However, she had opened herself to this line of questioning, so she is ready to walk down it.]

Yes, I have. Regrettably.

-- May I ask what they did to you?

[ peggy assumes something was done. she doesn't for a moment think of the alternatives. ]

[Wanda looks at the cup of tea in front of her. Her eyes seem to shimmer for a moment, as she lifts a hand into the air over the cup. She swirls her fingers a little, and the liquid sitting in her cup actually lifts itself out of the container. It seems to be levitating inside a scarlet red field of energy. It swirls in the air a little, before it is softly returned to the cup. Wanda's eyes and hand lose their crimson semi-luminescence, and she takes a sip of her drink.]

These things that I can do, they did not come to me naturally.

-- Hell's bells. [ a modest oath, but there is genuine strain in her expression as she considers what wanda now admits. is she another victim like the winter soldier? taken, and bent to new purpose? peggy's jaw works soundlessly for a moment. ]

I'm truly sorry.

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